


Fear and Uncertainty in Haven

by CookieDoughMe



Category: Haven (TV)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Gen, Haven Season Five, Morbid thoughts, The Crocker Curse, duke's pov, reference to major character death, reference to visions and tattoos, season five
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-07
Updated: 2020-06-07
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:20:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24588988
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CookieDoughMe/pseuds/CookieDoughMe
Summary: An extract from the Crocker family journal. One of the final pages before it ends.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	Fear and Uncertainty in Haven

They think my worst fear is a man with murder in his heart and a tattoo on his arm, but that's just the one I don't know how to deal with; the one I can't control. The very  _ worst  _ possibility is that I turn into my father (or Wade) - in thrall to the power of his own Troubled blood and heedless of the effects on those around him. 

There are other fears too of course. Everyone has them; too many to count for most of us. I don’t like the thought of dying at the hands of a malicious stranger (for all of Nathan’s posturing, I don’t actually think it will be him), but we all die eventually. It’s how I live my life until then that I’m more concerned with now. 

My worst fear is that this place eats away at me so much that I don’t recognise myself anymore. I always wanted to get away from Haven, for a hundred and one reasons for as long as I could remember. And I wanted to go  _ to  _ places as well; I wasn’t just running away from the Troubles and my father, I was running towards the world. I wanted to see everything and I wanted to do it on my own terms, beholden to no one else’s rules. And I did. For fifteen years or so I did, and I felt lucky every day to be in control of my own life and to visit the countries and the places that I did.

But then … this place, my father. That stupid promise I made to him started eating away at me. And the few people here I was still in touch with started telling me about strange things happening. Stories, rumours, mysteries that the Herald failed to mention, or news reports that bore no relation to actual events. I thought I’d come back just to check it out. Stay for a year maybe, no more.

It sounds ridiculous now I say it. Even if things had gone differently. This isn’t the kind of place you come home to and then just leave again. It was always going to be harder the second time around.

I didn’t know when I got here what my place in it all was. I still don’t. I know that I’ve tried to help, and I’ve tried to do that in a way that stays true to who I am and what I have to offer. I’m not Audrey, or Nathan or the Teagues or anyone else. I can only do what I can do, and I’ve always followed my instincts, worked within my rules, stuck to my own boundaries (as far as I could). I’ve done what was meaningful for me. I’ve tried to help. 

I guess everyone has tried to help this town, in their own way. Even the Teagues, even Jordan. Even Wade and my father on some level  _ thought  _ they were helping. Hell, even the Rev. That’s the real killer about this whole thing; however you look at it, everyone thought they were doing the right thing. (Everyone except for William and Mara, who just thought they could do no wrong.) And we don’t even know yet how it will play out. Whose version of victory will come to pass, or whether the town will be stuck in this battle forever.

That last possibility would be pretty high up there on that list of fears of mine. I’m not sure how much more this town can take, and I don’t want to see it fall apart. But for my own part, my worst fear isn’t death, or how it happens. Because I’ve always known who I am and who I want to be, but everything is illegal somewhere and it was never going to be the safest of careers, I knew that going in. And in any case everyone dies. At least I know I won’t die alone. 

My worst fear is that my life is taken away from me first; that the Troubles, or this aether, hollow me out and take me over and I can’t fight them off before I go. My worst fear is becoming a slave to something I hate, and being unable to pull myself free. It’s not the manner of my death I’m frightened of, so much as who I am at the time. Will Duke Crocker the Pirate Smuggler survive as long as I do? 

Everyone dies. I’m just praying to all of the gods I don’t believe in, that I get to die as me.


End file.
